Fall
by Suspicious Popsicle
Summary: Rainfall. Fall in love. Fall back on. Fall in line. Fall apart. Fall into place. Fall asleep.
1. Prologue

A/N: And now for something completely different. I say this in reference to the fact that all the other fics I've posted here (that I'll admit to) are from _Tales of Vesperia_. This is not a completely different No. 6 story, as it's me taking a bash at a reunion fic. Hopefully I did all right in terms of characterization. I did avoid some of the more common similarities I've noticed in these: Shion leaving the window open, a rainy day return, a four-year absence to keep the math tidy, and Shion having no priorities ranked higher than Nezumi.

I've read through some of the novel translations and borrowed a few details from there, but a lot of stuff comes from the anime, including the size of the bakery and the shape of Shion's scar. Anyways, I think there are only a few minor references to the novels, so it shouldn't be a problem for readers who've only seen the anime.

Disclaimer: The characters and settings in this story are from _No. 6_ and do not belong to me.

* * *

It seemed like I hadn't stopped moving for the whole of that first year after the parasite city, No. 6, fell. There was far too much to do in those early days when the city had become a seething mass of chaos. Most immediately, there were scores of people who had been injured in the catastrophe. I spent most of my time during those first weeks doing what I could to suture wounds, treat burns, acquire and distribute medicine, and anything else my limited experience would allow me to handle. Often, it turned out the only thing I could do was sterilize medical instruments or apply bandages.

Sometimes, more often than I liked, but less than I might have expected, I sat with a person before the end. When that happened, I would remember what Inukashi had once told me about Nezumi singing souls painlessly to their rest. I envied him that strange power, and missed him, but I never had much time to dwell on his absence.

Even as groups of us worked to get the injured cared for, other problems were brewing. The people of the West Block had flooded into the city and, although the strange daze that had settled over so many people seemed to help keep the peace during that first encounter, relations between the sides quickly deteriorated. Those from the West Block turned the city into an enormous, wild celebration of abundance and revenge. Some of those who had lived all their lives within the wall joined in the destruction and looting, whether through a sense of freedom or sheer panic. We were swamped with waves of people in need of care due to injuries or simple over-indulgence.

After a week of complete lawlessness, leaders from groups all over the city got together and decided that something had to happen to unite all the disparate elements. The way things were going, it would be surprising if any of the infrastructure necessary to sustain a population survived a year. Ten days after the walls surrounding No. 6 fell, we blew up the Moondrop.

It was spectacular. As I watched, I knew I was grinning with an expression every bit as wild as the chaos that had overtaken the city, but I didn't care. I'd always disliked the Moondrop. If its destruction could be the signal for the start of a new era, then that was all the better.

The revelry continued for another three days, but it had more of a festival air to it, and people were already turning their minds back to the work that needed to be done. More and more, people put aside their celebrations and turned their hands to helping the city rebuild and recover.

During those first disorganized, amazing months, I worked until I had no more strength left, ate when Mom pressed food into my hands, and slept wherever I passed out. I lost a lot of weight that I really couldn't afford to lose, but I was doing what was necessary, _and_ what was right. It felt good.

I had nightmares. That was only to be expected after everything I had done, I suppose. Exhaustion mostly kept them at bay, but I returned to the Correctional Facility time and time again in my sleep. Those were the worst of my nightmares, and the most common at first. I dreamed of Nezumi, too, good dreams and bad, which never failed to leave me lonely when I woke from them.

I felt Nezumi's absence the way I had after our first meeting: in flashes and daydreams. Random stimuli reminded me of the months we had lived together and the things he had taught me. I thought about him infrequently and out of the blue and forgot just as quickly as some new problem arose and demanded all my attention. I'd have missed him more if I'd had time to dwell, but I still believed that the two of us were connected and that I would see him again. I was able to content myself with that when work didn't keep my mind off him.

Once the initial madness and excitement of change had largely subsided, we turned our focus to rebuilding the essential parts of the city. The wall and the Correctional Facility hadn't been the only structures to fall that day. A lot of people had lost their homes, either because of the hunt or the tempest that had raged through No. 6. Either way, they needed shelter. Homes, hospitals, water lines, and roads were the first things we focused the rebuilding efforts on. People tore down the rest of the wall and carried it through the city like ants bringing back pieces of a prize too large to take whole into their colony. The wall was reabsorbed into the city that had created it.

Despite the good intentions of most involved, the beginning of the rebuilding phase was mired in chaos. With no central leadership to provide direction and orchestrate everyone's efforts, difficulties arose hourly. Eventually, people began to realize that someone had to be given at least the semblance of authority or nothing was going to get done. With the tragedy of what No. 6 had become still fresh in everyone's mind, however, the idea of giving someone that much power was pretty scary.

In the end it was decided that the city would be divided into districts and that every district would elect one person to serve on what would be called the Guidance Council. The Council would be allowed to organize the efforts of the groups rebuilding the city, and they had the authority to settle a dispute if it was brought before them. They had no power to enforce their decisions, though, and another group called the Oversight Committee, elected the same way as the Council, was created with the sole purpose of keeping watch on the Council to be sure it did not overstep its bounds or become corrupt.

Government by committee turned out to be a hugely slow process, but people were willing to work with the Council and it did help to organize everyone's efforts. By the end of that first year, the city was rebuilt enough so that most people had homes, and those that were able had gone back to their jobs. Life was starting to return to normal in the city people had begun referring to as No. 7.

At some point, the core group of people, myself included, that were involved in rebuilding the city had come to be known as the Planning Committee. The Council got into the treasury and, after months of arguing, they were allowed to begin issuing salaries to us for our work. It was the third paying job I'd held during my life and, back then, it was a good thing. During that first year and a half we were vital. After that, it was up to us to breathe life into No. 7 in the form of everything it had been missing for so long.

We converted old government buildings into museums, theaters, and libraries. We sent out letters, invitations, pleas to the other cities and welcomed back art, music, drama, creativity, and imagination. We caught some flak for tackling what some deemed an unnecessary project, but the majority mindset in that second year was still that anything No. 6 had forbidden must be something good, and so we were allowed to continue reacquainting the city with culture, helping it to find a soul.

I had more free time that year than before, and I spent more of it than I care to remember missing Nezumi fiercely. I had come to feel something for him that I'd never been properly able to put into words. I learned to name it in the second year of his absence and, knowing I was in love, I smiled even as my heart ached. Sure that he would return in his own time, I tried to be patient and wait.

In the third year, I was elected to the Oversight Committee. For someone who didn't really even like talking to people, it came as quite a shock to me. Somehow, word of my involvement with the fall of No. 6 had spread. That, combined with my efforts after the Holy Day disaster and my work with the Planning Committee had apparently earned me a very good reputation. I accepted the position, thinking that it might give me the opportunity to make a few sorely needed changes.

The school system had collapsed with the old government, and no one had earnestly sought to fix it out of fear that it would be too easy to manipulate the children. Instead, parents were encouraged to home school their children. A great many of No. 6's former elites began making their living as tutors.

I had no patience for the situation. Children with no parents were left without access to an education and, without some form of standardization or unified curriculum, there was no way to guarantee that the others were learning what they needed to. Nezumi had taught me that book-smarts would only get you so far, but that didn't make proper schooling useless by a long shot.

For months, I spent all my free time trying to get the Council to accept the importance of having an official, regulated school system. The close-mindedness and outright paranoia that ruled the people who were supposed to be leading No. 7 continually astonished me. Every bit of ground I gained with them was an uphill battle. Who would fund it when taxes weren't even regulated? Who would choose the curriculum? Who would choose the teachers? How could we be sure the children wouldn't end up brainwashed by a supporter of the old city?

The objections went on and on, and became progressively more ridiculous. One Council member actually wanted to ban former elites from teaching on the grounds that they would be more likely to defend the practices of No. 6. Another didn't want anyone who had been a resident of the West Block to be allowed to teach, claiming they were unsuited to the task of molding young minds. By then, most of the people I worked with knew of my past and that I had once been a member of both groups. It didn't stop them making those arguments when they picked apart my proposals.

Of course, there were people who supported me and helped argue the case, but with no one legitimately recognized as being in charge, it was a miracle we ever succeeded. No. 7 was entering its fourth year before the Oversight Committee and the Council finally relented and began implementing plans for a public school system.

In retrospect, it had been during that whole debacle that things began to go downhill.

During that time, I had been so focused on fighting against the stupidity born of fear and mistrust that I began to lose sight of what was happening to me. In my job with the Planning Committee, I was caught up again and again with increasingly useless plans to improve the city. Every time, I told myself that something good would come of it, that it would be the last one, anyway, and that, once the project was completed, I'd quit and leave No. 7 to go look for Nezumi.

I'd come to resent both the Council and the Oversight Committee as I struggled to ensure that children would grow up with access to an education. I cursed them for being slow and useless and foolish. There were so many times when I just wanted to give up, to run away from the city and leave it to sort out its own problems. During those times, the desire to see Nezumi again kept me awake at night, tossing and turning and wondering what he would do, but knowing that his path would be closed to me. Nezumi walked with destruction, but I wanted to build the city up, release it from the choking, dragging weight of its past and give its citizens a future.

In the end, I never did run away. I'd made No. 7 my responsibility, and I pushed through the bad days by reminding myself of small victories and repeating over and over that what I was doing would make a difference. Besides, it was kind of nice to have something like a normal life. I had a home, a steady job, plenty to eat, a safe environment…it was what most people wanted, what I'm sure a lot of people from the West Block would have killed for back when things were at their worst. It was a good thing and I was thankful, but sometimes, when I thought of my experiences before the fall of No. 6, I felt flashes of resentment for the comfortable life I led. Sometimes, I even hated myself a little for settling for it, but then I would see Mom smile at me, or someone would actually thank me for the work I did, and I would forget for a while my disenchantment.

Eventually, things got so busy between trying to create a proposal for a school system that would be approved and the ever-increasing projects the Planning Committee came up with that all the energy I'd had to be furious at the system was spent on my work.

I stopped wanting to chase after Nezumi. By the end of the fourth year, when I thought of him it was only to hope he was doing well. I didn't ache so sharply anymore when he crossed my mind, but I realized I was forgetting details of our time together, which depressed me all the same. That had been an amazingly important time for me. While Nezumi hadn't made me the person I am, he was the one who helped me to find myself when I'd been buried underneath the façade of an obedient, unquestioning citizen of No. 6. Nezumi had freed me from the city, both literally and figuratively, but he'd been gone for a long time and I could feel the connection between us fading. Sometime around the beginning of the fifth year since he'd left, I began to accept that he probably would not be coming back.

It was around that time that I first noticed that I was looking forward to storms with more than my normal appreciation for inclement weather. One day, after a particularly frustrating meeting with the Oversight Committee, I made my way home through a downpour. When I arrived, I went straight out onto the terrace, leaned over the side and shouted into the noise of the storm. It was just a couple of times, the same as it had been when Nezumi had caught me at it, and afterwards I felt some of the stress had been lifted from me.

I did it again three months later, and two months after that, and again barely three weeks after that. Soon, I was fighting back the urge to scream my resentment into every thunderstorm that passed through the city. I took to going out to the crumbling remains of the West Block for what had become something like a cleansing ritual for me. Out there, I never had to worry about anyone noticing what I was doing and declaring me imbalanced. I wouldn't be able to do anything for the city if no one would take me seriously.

I dealt with things that way for months. My days were spent working on increasingly frivolous projects for the Planning Committee or serving in my role as a member of the Oversight Committee. At night, I worked on proposals to solve the issues facing the lack of schools, law enforcement, taxation to keep everything running, and any number of things that cropped up and stuck in the gears of No. 7's laughable excuse for a government. I slept fitfully, plagued by nightmares and strange dreams, and subsisted mainly on meals and snacks pulled from the cases in Mom's bakery as I came and went. I screamed my frustrations into storms.

I had sunk into the morass of No. 7's useless system. I had lost my way and, worse than that, for the longest time I failed to even realize that I couldn't move.


	2. Fall

A/N: If you've never read George MacDonald's "The Light Princess," go read it. It is my absolute favorite fairy tale ever. The curse is based on a pun. You can find it free online.

Disclaimer: The characters and settings in this story are from _No. 6_ and do not belong to me.

* * *

I'd have to remember that Tuesday's specials made for a very busy lunch hour at Mom's bakery. There'd been enough time between that morning's review of the Guidance Council and my afternoon meeting with the Planning Committee that I'd thought I'd be all right dropping in at home to have a quick bite to eat. When I'd arrived to find Mom struggling to keep up with a mob of customers however, I wound up running register rather than stopping for lunch.

I didn't really mind. Helping at the bakery was practically my third job, though only my position on the Planning Committee came with a salary. Somehow, it managed to be both less boring and less stressful than either of my other jobs.

My work with the Planning Committee mostly centered around the physical rebuilding of the areas of No.7 that had been destroyed during the Holy Day disaster. During the first couple years, we focused on making sure people had homes, hospitals, and clean water. After that, we took it upon ourselves to invite in those elements that the city had been missing. Museums, libraries, and theaters sprang up in nearly every district. More recently, we'd simply been working on beautifying the city's parks and reforesting the barren area on the outskirts of No. 7.

The other committee I worked for was called the Oversight Committee. It was an elected position, and we weren't paid as a precaution against corruption. One person from every district was chosen to be a member. Our job was to watch over the Guidance Council, the group that led the city, although paranoia had kept people from even allowing the name of the group to suggest it was our governing body.

There was a ridiculous amount of red tape and paperwork over even the tiniest decision. People had been so scared of the past repeating itself that they'd practically hamstrung the government they did choose. The first several months had been hard as people from the former West Block and the people who had lived within the wall fought for acceptance from each other. They'd eventually learned to work together and, for a couple years, everyone really did seem to be trying their best for the sake of the city. Recently, though, it felt like egos and personal agendas were beginning to cloud the process, slowing everything down even further. I wondered sometimes if we had only taken a step sideways, rather than forward.

Lost in thought, I didn't notice the lunch crowd thinning out until Mom patted my shoulder.

"Thank you. I think I can handle things now."

"I don't mind helping out a little longer."

"Didn't you have a meeting today?"

"Sure, but not until—" I glanced at the clock. "I'm going to be late!"

I dashed around the counter, snatching a muffin on my way out the door when Mom called after me to eat something. I'd made it two blocks before I realized I'd forgotten my bag.

"My materials!"

I spun and started back the way I'd come. As I passed by the mouth of an alley, I caught a glimpse of a man with dark hair pulled up in a short ponytail. I almost didn't stop. There had been so many times in those first three years when I'd chased after a stranger or grabbed someone's arm only to find it had been nothing more than a passing resemblance that caught my attention. I'd broken myself of that habit and would have kept on going without looking back if he hadn't spoken.

"Still an airhead, I see."

The words—the _voice_—stopped me in my tracks. I _knew_ that voice, knew the tone, knew the expression he'd be wearing. The words echoed in my skull, shedding their original meaning, buzzing with the message that _he_ was back.

He was change, chaotic and destructive and necessary. He was typhoons and forest fires. He would tear through all the dead wood, wash the world clean, open the way for new growth, and I would be swept up with him and I would be _free_.

Feeling suddenly dizzy, I took a deep breath. I had been grinning fiercely, wide enough to bring an ache to my cheeks. I was equally surprised by his presence and my reaction to it. It was worse than being sixteen again and captivated by him. At least back then I hadn't felt as if I would lose myself in him.

I fixed a smile on my face—a normal one—and turned around. Nezumi stood on the sidewalk behind me, smirking just as I'd known he would be. He looked a little bit older, a little leaner, but very much the same as he had when I'd last seen him.

"Nezumi. Good to see you again," I said, because it was, and because I had no idea if 'welcome back' was appropriate. The idea of welcoming him _home_ somehow seemed completely out of the question.

"Shion."

All he had to do was say my name and my heartbeat sped up. At that moment, it felt like he could give me any command at all and I'd obey just to hear him say my name once more. I would throw away everything for him. I would turn my back on my job and all the responsibilities I'd taken on for the people of No. 7, I would give up my cushy life, I would leave Mom alone again as long as it meant I could stay by his side.

I shook my head, knowing it wouldn't do much good. I needed to calm down and process or I was going to lose control of the situation.

"Sorry, but I'm running really late for a meeting." Even as he took a step forward I was already starting back toward the bakery. "You can wait inside, if you want."

Mom opened the door just then, holding my bag and I took it gratefully.

"Thanks. Nezumi's here. I'll be back tonight." I kissed her cheek as she gaped and, before either of them could object, I was off running for all I was worth.

_He's back! Nezumi is back!_

I'd known he would be, of course—or at least I'd used to. I'd acknowledged long ago that the connection between us may well have eroded with time and distance. A year ago, I thought I'd accepted that he had moved on. I thought I'd been able to let go of him. To think that his return could affect me so strongly even after all this time….

He'd come and gone twice already and each time my life had been turned upside-down. I was thrilled by the prospect of it happening again, and terrified, and I stopped where I was, gasping, and peered up at the sky, raising my nose to sniff the air. It would be easier outside the city without walls and buildings to get in the way, but I thought I could detect a coming storm on the wind. It was a few days out still, but if I could last until then without doing anything crazy I'd be okay.

I don't know how I made it to the meeting with my head full of Nezumi and memories and questions. The other committee members had to halt the discussion to pull me back into the present twice before I excused myself, claiming illness.

_I have to get back to Nezumi. I have to go to him._

I locked myself in my office and laid my head on my desk. Sitting there in the dark, I tried to collect my thoughts.

He breezed in and said my name and suddenly I was a mess. I'd believed for so long that he would return. Even though I'd eventually given up, I felt that his presence shouldn't have effected me so much. It hadn't been like this before. I'd always been drawn to him, but I'd still been able to focus on what needed to be done.

"He would laugh so hard if he could see me now." I had to settle down, organize my thoughts, and regain some measure of control.

Had he gotten taller again? He'd certainly seemed larger than life standing there in the sunlight.

There was so much I wanted to ask him. Where did you go? What did you do, see, learn? What is the world like away from this city? What kind of people did you meet? Did you act? Did you fight? Did you have sex? Did you look for me in crowds, even though you knew I wouldn't be there? Why did you come back? Was it a whim? Was it for me? How long are you staying? Are you staying at all?

I had so many questions.

* * *

I flew, buffeted by breezes strong enough to topple trees. The world dropped away below me, pounded down by the storm and washed clean. The typhoon lifted me and I let go of everything, my worries, my cares, my responsibilities. I let the storm take everything, blow it all away, and I dissolved into the wind.

The sound of Nezumi's voice woke me.

"'Where unbruised youth with unstuff'd brain doth couch his limbs, there golden sleep doth reign.'"

"Sorry. Was I s'pposed to wash the dogs?"

"Time to join the rest of us in the present, Your Highness."

"Huh?" I looked around. We weren't in our room in the West Block. No, of course not. That had been years ago.

Rubbing my face, I sat up and yawned. I must have been more tired than I thought. If Nezumi was here, it had to have gotten pretty late. I'd have to apologize to Mom if I'd worried her.

"So. I guess you changed a little after five years."

_Almost six,_ I thought. I didn't say it. "It would have been strange if I hadn't. How have you been?"

He shrugged. "Your big meeting go well?"

"We're working on a new memorial for the upcoming anniversary of No.7." It wasn't a lie, I just wasn't answering his question. "You wouldn't believe the arguments they come up with. Last time—"

"Is this what we're going to do? Exchange empty small talk and pretend you didn't run the hell away from me as fast as you could earlier?"

I sighed. There really wasn't any way he'd have let that go. "I did have the meeting to get to. You can't just show up after six years and expect me to put aside my life for you. I have responsibilities."

He whistled, low and mocking. "This new No. 6 you're building has you brainwashed as well as the old one, doesn't it?"

His gall angered me. "We're trying, Nezumi, but it isn't easy. No one trusts us to do our jobs without turning into a bunch of mass murderers. There are still so many things that need to be done, but our hands are tied. Do you know it took me a _year_ to convince everyone on the Guidance Council that we still need a public school system? What's left of the police force can barely function. Fully a third of the laws have been thrown out, another third are in question. People are having to take lessons in street fighting from those who used to live in the West Block because there's no one who can protect them anymore."

"That doesn't sound like a bad thing. You should consider learning how to defend yourself."

"I've tried. Between one thing and another, I miss most of the classes."

For a minute, he stood there quietly, watching me.

"You don't look so good," he said at last.

"Thanks."

In an instant, he was around the desk, lifting my chin up to study my face. My breath caught in my throat as I stared into his eyes. They had such an amazing luminescence.

"I mean it. You look…tired."

When he brushed my hair back, I couldn't help smiling. I remembered those touches from him, rare moments of tenderness that, according to Inukashi, only I had been privy to. Without quite meaning to, I leaned into his touch, pressing my cheek into the palm of his hand. I'd always been comfortable with him. That hadn't changed.

"Shion."

Suddenly, his face was much closer to mine than it had been. Before he could kiss me, I pulled back and turned away. I'd spent almost six years waiting for him after our last kiss. I wasn't going to do that again.

After a moment, he backed away. "Come on. Let's get you back to your mama."

We didn't talk as I followed him out of the building. On the street, I took a deep breath of fresh air. I was certain I could smell a storm coming. It couldn't arrive too soon.

"Did you have a chance to see the city today?"

"Some. You put my books in a library."

I couldn't tell if he was pleased or annoyed about that. Somehow, during the first month after the wall fell, I'd found time to carry them all out of our old room. It hadn't been long before I'd realized that I couldn't keep them with me, though. They reminded me too much of Nezumi, and Nezumi had left. I couldn't bear the idea of hiding them away in storage either, so I had made them the first additions to the new wing of the central library. After that, other donations poured in. It was astonishing to see how many books of poems and stories and plays people had held on to in defiance of the old regime's disapproval. I kept up my reading with these donations. I would have liked to be able to read Nezumi's, but I could smell our home trapped in the pages and it made me long for the past when my focus needed to be on the future.

"I saw a couple theaters."

There was definitely a note of approval in his voice. I didn't try to discuss the theaters with him. I had yet to set foot inside any theater except the one in the West Block where he'd performed.

The silence dragged on for a few minutes until he stopped and turned to frown at me. "Now I know something's wrong. Why aren't you pestering me with stupid questions or talking up the changes you've made to the illustrious No. 6? I'd expected you to wear out your tongue nattering at me."

I smiled a little at that. He'd always encouraged me to learn about the real world, but then been so annoyed when I insisted on drilling him for answers. Had he missed that part of me?

"I have questions. I've got so many, I don't even know what to do with them. Why don't you talk to me? Tell me about what you did when you left. I'll ask you to expand or clarify on points as it occurs to me."

So he started talking. He told me about visiting the other cities, seeing what they had to offer. He told me about wandering the wildernesses in-between. He talked me through the front room of Mom's bakery, pausing only long enough for me to apologize for worrying her and grab a snack. He talked me up the stairs to my room where we spent the next few hours getting reacquainted through words and questions and retorts, demands for me to shut up and laughter and seriousness and odd moments of silence broken by new anecdotes, and through the single blanket we wrapped around ourselves as we sat on the floor, backs against the frame of my bed, shoulder-to-shoulder, side-by-side.

This was how it had been between us more often than not back then. It was easy, comfortable. I'd forgotten how nice it was. After a few years had passed, I'd even forgotten how much I'd missed it.

Six years. Six years had gone by and, while I'd learned more about books and a negligible amount about fighting, I still knew nothing of sex and little more than I had about friendship. I was busy now, busier than I ever had been, and the work was important, even fulfilling at times, but had I changed at all? Was I still that idealistic airhead Nezumi had rescued from the soul-sucking stagnation of No. 6?

I felt tears prickling my eyes and excused myself to the bathroom. Staring into the mirror, I watched them overflow uncontrollably. I studied my face through the blurring of my vision, tracing the scar that marked me as a survivor of the parasite bees across my cheek and around my neck. I looked older, didn't I? My hair wasn't as shaggy, though it needed another trim. I'd grown and changed, hadn't I?

"Shion?" Nezumi was standing just inside the door. I met the reflection of his eyes and saw concern there.

"Sorry. I can't seem to stop it." I managed a shaky smile for him, and he smirked in return, shifting to lean against the doorframe.

"So you did miss me. I was beginning to wonder."

"Of course I missed you! Give me a minute to collect myself and we'll get back to catching up."

"What, and miss this? I finally get my tearful reunion and you're trying to chase me away? Forget it."

"Nezumi!" Spinning, I took a swipe at him and he dodged, grinning and throwing his arms wide.

"Not like that! You're supposed to come rushing into my waiting arms. Try again."

Laughing through my tears, I tried to hit him again, and again he moved just out of reach. He led me down the short hall like that, back into my room, and I couldn't help remembering our first meeting and the way he'd teased me about screaming into the storm, baiting me until I lunged too close and he had me pinned and at his mercy in a matter of seconds.

I lurched forward, catching my foot on the rug, and Nezumi must have known I was falling before I did, because he was waiting to catch me.

"You're terrible at this," he murmured. He brushed back my hair, cupped my face with his hand.

"I'm almost as tall as you are." I couldn't help voicing the observation. "There's barely any difference."

We were so close. When he laughed, our foreheads bumped together. Looking into his eyes, I could see a warmth there that was new. Somewhere over the past six years, he'd found some measure of peace.

Fresh tears stung my eyes. His nose touched mine. All it took was the barest tilt of my chin to bring our lips together.

A tension I hadn't even noticed in him was released. His hands slid down past my shoulders and he laced his fingers together over the small of my back. Even after we broke the kiss, we stood like that, holding each other.

"I missed you," he admitted. I couldn't see his face, but I felt the movement of his jaw against my cheek. "I heard a story while I was traveling about a red thread that wraps around two people to bind them together. It made me think of you." His fingers traced over my shirt where the scar wrapped around my shoulder blade.

"I think that's more likely to connect me to the bees, or maybe the city, even."

He pulled back so I could see him roll his eyes. "You have the soul of a scientist. Not a shred of romance in it at all."

"We have our own connection," I assured him.

I had felt it almost painfully strongly for the first couple years while I waited and hoped he was all right. I felt it when I resented the uselessness of the new government and my responsibilities that held me here, kept me from leaving to search for him. I felt it less as that government and those responsibilities had taken over more and more of my time, leaving me only the occasional moment to hope he was doing well. I'd almost buried it this last year with the acceptance that our paths might never cross again. Now, though, it hummed within me, and the resolve I'd found over the past six years was already crumbling against it.

"Do you have a place to stay?" At this hour, it was at least safe to assume he was staying the night, right?

"No. I was sort of hoping you'd have a spare room."

"We don't. You can sleep in here, though." He looked around. There was no couch and little floor space. "The bed is big enough, I think."

He smirked at that, arching a brow, and I smiled back at him. We fell asleep that night back-to-back, and though I was pretty sure Nezumi was awake when he rolled over later on and threw an arm over me, I didn't really mind all that much.

* * *

Neither of my committees met on Wednesday mornings, so I had taken to using the time to hold a story circle at the central library. It had begun with just Karan and Rico, the children I'd read to in the West Block. My scar usually made kids afraid to approach me, but with those two so obviously unconcerned about it, I had soon gained a small following.

Nezumi tagged along with me that morning. He complained a bit about my lack of free time, but I'd caught the little smile when I'd told him what I was doing. Fondness was an oddly appealing look on him. It did interesting things to my heart.

The kids took to Nezumi with amusing alacrity, and I watched for a few minutes as he struggled to keep up with them and their questions. Finally, I decided he'd had enough and got them settled down in a circle. Nezumi squatted behind me as I took my place.

"It's like a herd of tiny Shions," he muttered.

"They like you."

"Don't use that smile when you say things like that. It's creepy."

"Hush," I scolded gently. The kids were getting restless. It was time to begin.

We'd been working our way through old children's stories by author. Today I'd selected George MacDonald's "The Light Princess." I managed to make it a few sentences into the story before Nezumi interrupted me.

"I think your delivery has actually gotten worse. How is it you manage to draw an audience every week? Give me that."

He snatched the book away from me and stepped into the center of the circle to read. I had to admit, he made a better show of it than I did. He moved restlessly, pacing and turning so that none of the children were at his back for more than a moment or two. He made exaggerated faces and changed his voice. The kids laughed and squealed with delight and loved him.

As I watched, I couldn't help but smile, even as the display made me feel uneasy. Six years ago, I had watched him closely and only every now and then noticed a subtle sign that he had any compassion for the kids of the West Block. Or rather, the compassion he showed them appeared much harsher than my own half-hearted attempts. The openness he showed now was strange. Was this just his actor's spirit shining through, or had he changed more than I'd thought?

Toward the end, he caught my gaze and faltered. His movements lost some of their enthusiasm. His voice, as he hurried through the ending, wasn't quite as excited. Was he embarrassed by my scrutiny, or was I still an open book to him?

"That was nice," I said as the kids dispersed.

"You didn't like it."

"Yes I did. Why would you—"

"You still can't lie worth a damn."

_Maybe not to you._ "It wasn't the performance I had a problem with. You weren't like that before. You've changed. I don't like feeling like I don't know you. I don't like feeling like we're strangers."

The silence said it all as we left the library. We _were_ strangers.

"How long are you staying?"

"I don't know."

The easy atmosphere we'd found between us last night had vanished in the light of day. I felt distracted. I had reports to finish, paperwork to fill out. At the same time, being near Nezumi made me feel as if I was only waiting for the other shoe to drop. If Nezumi was back, didn't that mean something was going to happen to render everything I'd been working on moot? Wasn't that his role in my life: to open my eyes to what was important when I'd been blinded by what I'd been taught?

_The system is already broken. _

_Destroy it. _

I shook my head, took a slow, deep breath. Faintly, I could smell rain on the air. Tomorrow, it would storm. It would be a big one.

"Why don't we get some lunch before I have to go back to work?"

He agreed without enthusiasm and I took us to a small café I liked. I filled up the silence with talk about the progress the city had made in his absence, feeling quite the accomplished bullshitter by the time I left him back at Mom's bakery.

* * *

There was a copy of the minutes from the meeting I'd missed waiting for me on my desk. It was twelve pages that basically said our budget was shot and that everyone was required to have a proposal for the new memorial ready for tomorrow's meeting.

One of the ladies from the committee stopped in to see if I was all right.

"We all have our off-days," she said when I assured her I was fine.

_You're a broken cog._

"You should really try to take better care of yourself, though. You look awfully tired."

_A broken cog in a broken machine._

"And all that delicious baking your mother does is starting to make you a teensy bit tubby!" She laughed a little, joking around. Usually it didn't bother me. Today it grated on my nerves.

_We're all broken cogs. _

_The machine can't be fixed. _

_Smash it._

"Are you all right?"

"Sorry. I have a bit of a headache."

"Oh, well I hope you get to feeling better, dear. Don't fret about the memorial. We'll be arguing over it until next year, anyway. And if you need to duck out early today, don't worry: I won't tell." She winked at me and finally—thankfully—left.

I looked around my office, the space as impersonal as when I'd first begun working here, and fought back the sudden urge to scream, to shred the papers, break the furniture, tear down the walls. How long had I been a part of this committee? Four years? Five? What good was I doing here? Who was I helping? Maybe Nezumi had been right about the city brainwashing me. This had been important work, once. When had we become nothing but a glorified garden society?

The storm would arrive tomorrow. I just had to hold on until tomorrow night, then I could take all my frustrations, all my anxiety and anger and give them to the storm, toss them away on the wind. Then I'd be okay for a little while. Just one more day.

Over the next couple hours, I did my best to concentrate on my work. I was getting paid for this, after all. It wouldn't be right to just ignore it. I was almost finished with my proposal when I was interrupted.

"Hard at work, as usual."

I looked up to see Inukashi standing just inside the doorway while a guard dog sat waiting in the hall.

Stretching, I leaned back and smiled. "What brings you by?"

"Nezumi is back in town."

"I know. He's staying at the bakery."

"You've already seen him? Then what was he doing coming to me to ask about you?"

"I couldn't say. What did you tell him?"

"Said you were really trying to make a difference but the system has you mired in bullshit."

I threw back my head at that and laughed and laughed until I cried. I must have worried Inukashi.

"It wasn't that funny."

_No,_ I thought, wiping my eyes. _It _really_ isn't._

Inukashi considered me for a moment. "I think he actually loves you."

"It's possible." I shrugged. "Lots of things are possible."

"Used to be, you would say anything is possible."

"My work has shown me otherwise."

"That's a shame." There was no overt signal, but the dog stood, ready to go. In the next minute, both of them were gone.

Inukashi wasn't known for joking. Maybe Nezumi did love me. Maybe he loved the memory of who I had been. I'd loved him for so long, but he'd been gone for most of that time and I'd been forced to put him out of my mind or go crazy. One day wasn't enough to get back that balance we'd had during our time together in the West Block. I needed time to work this out.

I put the finishing touches on my proposal and left early. I'd be home with enough time to help Mom make dinner. Maybe, with all three of us sharing a meal, it wouldn't be as awkward as lunch had been.

* * *

Nezumi and I took care of cleaning up after dinner. I had just put away the last of the dishes when he grabbed my hand and dragged me out of the kitchen.

"Where are we going?"

"Out onto the terrace. I want to see if you still remember how to dance."

The sun had already set. It was cold out, and we couldn't see the stars for the lights of the city, but when Nezumi pulled me close I felt comfortably warm and as he guided me in circles around the terrace with a murmured chorus of 'one-two-three, one-two-three' I grew increasingly secure in my steps. Soon, he stopped keeping time and just smirked at me while I did my best to keep pace with him.

I don't know how long we danced like that, but when he finally released me, I dropped into a chair, gasping and pleasantly exhausted. My sweater was too warm and I pulled it off, tossing it aside. Nezumi sat down across from me, looking amused as he watched me cool down from the workout.

"Well, I can't say you've learned much, but at least you haven't gotten worse."

"Thanks for the praise." As my breathing returned to normal, I felt again the chill of the night and shivered.

"Come here."

I picked up my sweater and crossed the small space between us. As soon as I was within reach, Nezumi grabbed my arm and yanked me down to sit on his lap, wrapping his arms around me against the cold. It wasn't comfortable in the chair, but it was warm.

"Just right?" I could hear his smirk in his voice.

"What are we doing?" His grip on me was suddenly less sure. "Inukashi says you love me."

"Inukashi should know better than to gossip about me."

"You aren't denying it."

"Do you want me to?"

I thought about that for a moment. "No. Not really."

"So, what's the problem?"

"I need time."

"Wasn't five years—"

"In two months, it will have been six years."

"Wasn't six years enough time to think about this?"

"Apparently it was for you. For me, six years was just enough time to accept that you'd left."

Silence fell between us. I guess he didn't have much to say to that. After a moment, I sighed and stood up.

"I've got to get to bed. The Oversight Committee's meeting in the morning and I have a presentation in the afternoon."

He nodded, but didn't otherwise move. I was just stepping inside when he spoke up.

"Did you love me back then?"

"Yes." I spoke softly, knowing he would still hear me. "Very much."

I left him alone out there before he could ask me if I still loved him. If he asked, I would have to tell him the truth, and I was already too much in his power. To admit that now would mean being swept up by him and losing myself. I needed to get my feet back under me before anything could happen between us…assuming he stuck around long enough for that to even be a possibility.

* * *

I dreamed of the night Nezumi and I had first met. In the dream, I screamed into the typhoon. I screamed and screamed, and the climate control system never went off, Nezumi never appeared in my room. The storm poured in and water filled my room up to the ceiling until I was drowning in it.

Thankfully, I was alone when I woke gasping for air. I don't know where Nezumi had slept. I dressed hurriedly and found him downstairs having breakfast with Mom. There were fresh apple fritters on the table and I ate one standing up, shifting anxiously from foot to foot. I wanted to get going, to start the day and get it over with.

"You seem excited this morning," Nezumi said. It wasn't excitement that kept me from standing still, though. It was anticipation.

"I'll be home late, tonight."

Realization dawned on Mom's face, followed quickly by concern. "It's going to storm this evening."

"I know. I'll be careful." I couldn't wait around any longer. Grabbing my bag, I kissed Mom's cheek.

"What, no kiss for me?"

Without thinking, I leaned in to repeat the gesture for Nezumi. I grinned at him as I pulled back, and I knew there was more than a hint of wildness in the expression. This storm was rolling in just in the nick of time. Waving, I rushed off into the city.

That nervous energy of mine quickly became a curse, as I was forced to sit through a meeting of the Oversight Committee that dragged on and on to no result. One after another, the other members stood up to say the same things they'd said during the last meeting and the one before that and the one before that.

_Sluggish._

The Guidance Council was doing fine. It wasn't powerful enough to do any harm.

_Weak._

Still, we had to be ever alert to the threats of corruption and control. We could not become lax in our duties.

_Broken. _

_Smash it. _

_Destroy it._

The Planning Committee was no better. I only half-listened to the arguments.

"I don't think we ought to have flowers at the memorial. They attract bees. We don't want to remind people of those horrible things."

"The whole point of the memorial is to remind people of what happened! We can't have anyone forgetting what No. 6 was like. We'd just end up walking down that same path!"

"We can remind them without terrifying them! Think what it would be like for the survivors!"

Slowly, I became aware that everyone was either staring at me or very obviously trying to look at anything but me. Aside from myself, there were no other survivors of the bees in the city, only the families the victims left behind.

"Shion, what do you think?"

_Smash it. _

_Destroy it. _

* * *

The storm was just getting started when the meeting ended, and I ran out into the rain, gasping for breath after the suffocating waste of time and resources that my job had become. I fled the city as the rain fell heavier and the wind picked up, blowing it in freezing sheets against me, soaking me over and over, washing me clean.

I ran panting and shaking and stumbling, half-blind with water and darkness, until I came to the setting for my ritual. Here was the hill where Nezumi had first pulled me out of the sewers. Here was my first view of No. 6 from the outside. Here was my first view of the real world.

I stood on top of that crumbling, barren hill, freezing and drenched, as the storm raged around me and thunder crashed in the clouds above, and I screamed out across the land, across the city. I poured all my rage and impotence out into the night to be carried away on the howling wind. I screamed until I was hoarse, until I felt empty. I screamed until I collapsed to my knees, sodden and drained, but free of the impulse to tear apart the pathetic mockery of a government the people of No. 7 had chosen for themselves.

Head bowed, I knelt there for a few minutes, a few ages, as the rain pounded on my back. Eventually, I found the strength to stand up, though I didn't think I could make it back home just yet. I stumbled down the hill and, even in the darkness, even more than four years after my last visit, I still made my way easily to the steps leading down to the room Nezumi and I had shared.

The roof had been partially caved in, but it had been that way since the hunt. I'd seen it when I went back for the books. The room felt empty without them. Water leaked in, dripping rhythmically on the moldy, ruined bed. The couch had remained mostly undamaged, and I dropped onto it gratefully, resolving to rest for only a few minutes before going home.

* * *

"Shion, wake up." I felt a hand shaking my shoulder. "Shit. Shion, you're freezing. Wake up."

"Nezumi?"

"Who else?" He yanked my shirt off me and threw it aside. It landed with a wet slap on the floor. His own coat, blessedly warm and much drier, replaced it around my shoulders. "What the hell were you doing?"

"I must have fallen asleep. What time is it?"

"After ten. What were you doing out here? I knew you were an idiot, but I didn't think you were stupid enough to let yourself freeze to death."

"I had to let it all out." Realizing I couldn't feel my fingers, I stared at them, flexing, until Nezumi took my hands between his and blew on them, breath scorching hot against my skin.

"It's funny," I said, and laughed. "Sometimes it surprises me that the human race has survived so long. Everything is on the verge of falling apart because people are too afraid to give anyone enough power to fix it. You wanted to destroy No. 6, and now this slow, hulking monstrosity it turned into is going to destroy itself. It's funny, isn't it?"

"Shion…."

Suddenly, I was furious again, as if I hadn't just shed my pent up frustrations, as if my ritual had been nothing more than an empty gesture. Apparently, its usefulness had worn off. I'd hit my breaking point.

"I'm so sick of it, Nezumi! I can't do anything to make a difference because they're all too scared of what happened. Every time I try to do something good for the city, I'm buried in paperwork and red tape and roadblocks. How can we move forward when they're stuck in the past? I just want to break it all apart and start over, but I _can't_ because any time someone even _suggests_ that the new system isn't working, they're shouted down and accused of wanting a return to tyranny."

I leaned over to wrap my arms around him, pressing my face into his chest and clenching fistfuls of his shirt in my hands. The city was drowning me. For so long, all I'd tried to do was fix it, make it a place where people could live together happily. I wanted to build something Nezumi would have approved of on the ashes of the city he'd hated, but what difference had I made in the end? Too ineffective to be evil, too caught up in the past to protect the future, the city was stagnating even as it struggled to survive. It was going to collapse, and there was nothing I could do.

"You were right. It brainwashed me. It sucked me in and I got stuck. I don't know what I should do. Somewhere along the way, I lost sight of which direction I should move."

"I told you before not to give me that bullshit about not being able to move, didn't I? If you can't see a path, then make your own. Leave it all behind and see if that gives you a better view. To put it in terms even you can understand: take a sabbatical."

I laughed, relaxing in his arms. "Where should I start?"

"Come with me when I leave."

"Nezumi…." I pulled back to stare at him, unsure.

"I'm the one who first showed you there was a world outside No. 6, right? Why shouldn't I be the one to show you the rest of it?"

"And then what? Sabbaticals have to end. What happens when I have to come back here? I don't want to wait another six years for you. I don't think I can."

"Who says you have to? We'll stay as long as you can, then leave when you can't stand it anymore."

"What if I don't want to leave again?"

He pinched the bridge of his nose. "You are making this much more difficult than it needs to be. Do you remember that first night we danced here? Afterwards, you reached out and touched my neck. I don't think you ever even realized what you had done but, Shion, you passed through my defenses like they weren't even there and touched a pressure point. If you had wanted to kill me, you could have. When you—a sheltered little Petri dish elite—did that, it shocked me to my core. I remember thinking: 'Who is this kid?' It took me a long time to realize that it wasn't something intrinsic that made you special, but what I had given you."

"I thought I was supposed to be the unromantic one."

"Shut up and listen. I didn't realize it then because I wasn't ready for it, but I trusted you. I'd watched you for years, Shion. I knew you long before I let you into my life. I knew you couldn't hurt me—not physically, anyway, and I didn't even consider that I might get attached to you—and, deep down, I knew you wouldn't hurt me, even if I tried to kill you."

"You wouldn't have, though."

"You're wrong. In those first weeks, I might have. If I'd gotten angry enough or scared enough or if you'd ever shown the slightest bit of fear if I attacked you, I would have killed you. You were living with a time bomb and you never even knew it." He paused and looked at me, considering. "You never once were afraid of me, though, were you?"

"No. I never saw any reason to be."

"I ought to be insulted by that." He squeezed my shoulders. After a moment, his smile faded. "Anyway, my point was that while I was gone, I worked through a lot of my issues, one of which was you."

"I'm not one of your issues."

"Close enough. I _missed_ you Shion. I've never missed anyone like that. I've never trusted anyone else. I figure there are worse things to start off a relationship with."

"What kind of relationship?"

"Friendship first, if you insist." He took my hand and twined his fingers with mine, and the smile he gave me made my heart skip a beat. Our connection thrummed through me, sparking along nerves, tingling on my skin. "Unless I miss my guess, something more wouldn't be unwelcome."

I could feel myself blushing as I met his eyes. "No. Not unwelcome."

We kissed again, our fourth kiss. This one was different, though. This wasn't just a chaste brush of lips. Nezumi's tongue brushed against my lips, parting them and slipping into my mouth. I squeaked a little, surprised, and heard the huff of what must have been a laugh from him as he pressed forward. The arm he'd had around my shoulders slipped down to my waist.

"Fuck, that's cold!" He jumped back suddenly, staring at me, at his hand, at my legs. He must have touched the drenched fabric of my pants. "Shit, I forgot you were soaked. Why didn't you say anything?" He sighed. "Get up. Let's get you home and warmed up. Your mama's probably worried."

"I'm old enough to take care of myself."

"Shion, there is ice forming on your pants. Get up and let's go." He grabbed my hand as we began the walk back.

"Nezumi, do you believe in that red thread story?"

He eyed me speculatively for a moment. "No. I do believe we have our own connection, though."

I squeezed his hand. I'd never stopped trusting him. I'd never stopped loving him. Now, though, I felt we were due for a new beginning. I could leave the city behind, let it sort itself out. Maybe the residents would learn. Nezumi had come back. He'd come back to show me something new, something exciting. That was infinitely more important to me than the foolishness of the people trying not to run No. 7.

"So, how long have you been running to my old room to hide out during storms?"

His tone was teasing. I supposed he expected to fluster me the way he had when we were twelve and he'd seen me shouting into the typhoon. He'd gotten it wrong, though.

"'Wild nights are my glory.'"

"Those aren't your words. You've never expressed yourself so elegantly. Who are you quoting?"

"Don't be rude. I used the words, that makes them mine."

"Not how it works. Don't you know about properly attributing sources?"

"What, you really don't recognize it?"

"Your estimation of me is far too lofty if you think I've read every book there ever was. Title and author, please. I want to know what you've been filling that empty head of yours with while I've been gone."

"_A Wrinkle in Time_ by Madeline L'Engle." A whole set of novels and that one little quote was what had resonated strongest with me.

Nezumi made a little grunt of acknowledgement. I couldn't see his face in the darkness, but I could picture the expression he used to make when he filed away a piece of information for later study.

It seemed he'd forgotten about my real reasons for having ventured out into the storm, which was well enough, really. I should have known something was wrong when I first starting feeling the urge to do that. I should have recognized it as the warning sign it was and done something to pull myself out of the morass of bureaucracy that was choking No. 7 and, by extension, me. If Nezumi hadn't come back to the city and woken me up….

By the time we got home, my teeth were chattering and I couldn't feel my legs. The only thing that got me up the stairs was the promise of a hot bath. Well, that and Nezumi's comment that if I couldn't make it all the way back on my own power, I might as well have just let the storm wash me away. I glared at his back as he bounded silently up the steps before me, but he had a point. I was actually glad he didn't help me. No matter how much he had changed over the years, that level of attentiveness from him would have been downright creepy.

I made it to the bathroom and peeled off my pants. They weren't actually anywhere near cold enough to form ice, though it certainly felt that way. My legs were clammy and just the feel of the air against them was hot enough to burn. I started the water running and hung Nezumi's coat on the doorknob before sitting down in the tub, hugging my knees to my chest and shivering violently as the water slowly rose around me.

As soon as the tub was full enough, I drew a deep breath and ducked below the surface, immersing myself as fully as I could. Surrounded by warmth, I thawed and I thought.

I would give my two weeks' notice tomorrow. I should have done it a year ago, more. The only reason I'd been on the Planning Committee in the first place was because they'd been doing the most important work I could help with during the first few years. After that…after that I'd just let myself be dragged along. Caught up in living a normal life again after so much chaos, I'd lost sight of what needed to be done. I'd begun to stagnate as surely as the system had.

My lungs burned. I surfaced, gasping, and ran my hands through my hair, combing it back out my face. I felt alive again, and not just because of the bath. Nezumi traveled with the winds of change. His return breathed vitality back into my life just like he had twice before.

He whistled from the doorway and the suddenness of the sound made me jump. Holding a bundle of my clothes in one hand, he closed the door behind him and leaned up against the sink.

"Very sexy. I'd be impressed if I thought you could have pulled that off knowing I was there."

"What are you talking about?"

Smirking, he set the clothes aside and mimed coming up out of the water. He threw his head back, exposing the pale line of his throat and pushed his hair away from his face. The expression on his face was practically euphoric, eyes half closed, lips parted. Sexy indeed. There was no way I'd looked like that.

He focused that look onto me, and I felt my cheeks go pink, felt something twist in my stomach and stir in my groin. All of a sudden, I became hyperaware that I was completely naked and alone with Nezumi.

I'd never felt like this around him before, but now I could put a name to my feelings for him, and he had spoken of things changing between us. Words were powerful things: they had made real the possibilities that had been locked away in the back of my mind. Suddenly, I wanted so badly for him to touch me, and not just pat my cheek or thread his fingers through my hair. I wanted him to _touch me_, everywhere, intimately, like a lover would. He'd taught me many things in our time together, but he hadn't taught me about sex and I hadn't sought out other chances to learn. It had never seemed terribly important until that moment.

Obviously, some of those thoughts were going to come across on my face. I'd never been very good at hiding what I was thinking, and this particular bundle of feelings and wants and vague imaginings had hit me pretty hard and all at once. Nezumi's expression cleared into surprise a moment before he dropped his gaze from mine.

"I brought you a change of clothes," he said.

"Thank you."

He shifted uneasily, but didn't leave. Neither did he look at me, but I was certain he knew I was studying him. The toe of his boot tapped on the floor, faster and harder as the silence dragged on. He sighed, crossed his arms, uncrossed them, leaned back against the counter and braced himself on his palms. I'd never seen him like that. It was intriguing, but I had more pressing subjects to explore.

"Nezumi, come here."

He obeyed. I hadn't thought he would. He'd always been contrary, but this time he pushed away from where he stood next to the sink and crossed the small space between us to kneel beside the tub. He met my eyes then, his expression closed off, and I watched his face for clues. The smile I offered only seemed to make him wary.

"You taught me a lot of things. Probably the most important lessons of my life came while I lived with you. If I go with you, I'm sure I can learn even more about the world and about myself."

I lifted a hand out of the water and he let me touch his cheek and brush back his hair. He still seemed unsure, not least because he hadn't scoffed at me or tried to interrupt.

"I disagree with you a lot and we argue, but I think that's a good thing. I think both of us learn that way. You've helped me learn to express myself and to understand the kind of person I am. I've never had a better teacher. I want to learn all sorts of things from you."

We were nose-to-nose now, and I had to give him credit for his ability to maintain an unreadable expression. I still couldn't tell if he wanted to back away from me or close that last, tiny space between us.

"I want to know what it's like to have sex."

A muscle twitched in his jaw. Slowly, his customary smirk spread across his face.

"Damn, you're long-winded. All that nonsense about me teaching you—and when did you ever actually learn any of the things I tried to teach you, anyway?—just to try and get me into bed? Weren't you the one who said he needed time? Capricious prince, slave to your curiosity, and still not a drop of romance in your soul."

"You said you wanted something more than friendship."

"I am not going to fuck you because of some inquisitive whim of yours. You wanted time to get your head on straight, so get a hold of your hormones and figure out exactly what it is that you want. Ask me again once you've done that."

He got up to leave. I watched his back, studying the set of his shoulders and recognizing frustration in the tension there. I observed the play of muscles beneath his shirt and wondered what it would feel like to run my hands over his back as he moved and feel that flex and shift under my palms.

"Six years ago you didn't believe me when I tried to tell you." He stopped as I spoke, one hand on the doorknob. "I don't blame you. You were right when you told me I didn't know what I was saying. Even if I had gotten it right, I wouldn't have understood the meaning behind the words I needed. I wouldn't have understood how they applied to how I felt about you." Needing to steady myself, I took a breath. I could do this. I knew what words I needed. I knew what they meant, and I knew the truth in them. Words had power. "If I give you the right words now, would you believe me?"

"You don't need to rush—"

"I've had the time I needed. I made my decision."

He turned back toward me, frowning. "That was awfully quick. Sure you aren't being too hasty?" His words held the bite of sarcasm.

"I love you, Nezumi. I love your wit and your intelligence, even when you use them to cut me down to size. I love your intensity and your impulsiveness. I love your eyes and the way you talk. I love how you can be kind without seeming to. I love that you bring me knowledge and change. I just love you."

It had been quite a lot of powerful words. I felt warm and a little lightheaded.

"Unbelievable. Have you actually changed at all since I saw you last?" He stepped forward as he talked until he was right beside the tub, looking down on me. "That was cliché at best. Only you could pull off a performance like that with a straight face. I think it's beyond even my talent."

"When you're finished criticizing me, I'd like a proper response. I was serious, you know."

"A rank amateur _and_ impatient. Well, you'd already established that."

Sighing, I stood up. Words had power, but actions were supposed to speak louder than words.

"Since you aren't going to answer me seriously," I said, reaching for his collar, "be quiet." I'd surprised him, and it afforded me the chance to yank him forward into a kiss.

This time, he responded exactly the way I'd wanted him to, parting my lips with his tongue and pulling me close, crushing me against his chest. It wasn't the kind of magical, romantic moment people write about in stories. I stubbed my toe on the inside of the tub, and Nezumi had to be getting uncomfortably damp as his shirt soaked up the water still dripping down my body. It was our moment, though, and I wouldn't have traded it for anything.

I could feel his hands on my skin, searching, and a moment later he found the scar that bound me to him. Lightly, he trailed his fingers along it, the sensation of his touch tingling along my skin when he brushed alongside and fading to little more than a gentle pressure over top of the scar tissue. As his fingertips brushed my side, I couldn't help laughing and realized, with some surprise, that I was ticklish. How did a person grow to be twenty-two and not know he was ticklish?

"See?" I asked. "You're teaching me things even now."

He looked more disgruntled than anything. "I have no idea what you're talking about. Have you hit the point where exhaustion turns to giddiness?"

"Possibly. I feel sort of…."

I shook my head. I didn't really have a word for it, and there were too many that weren't quite right. Giddy, dizzy, bubbly, dreamy, ready to burst, ready to drift away. I felt free and buoyant, like Nezumi was the only thing keeping me from floating off. When he squeezed me tighter, expression turning concerned, I realized that he was probably the only thing holding me up, as well. My legs felt shaky and not up to the task.

"You should rest."

"I'm fine. Kiss me again."

"Sure. If you'll stand up and get out of the tub." He started to relax his hold on me and I felt myself slipping back down. If he let go, I knew my legs would buckle and I'd fall.

"I think you may have caused me to go a bit weak in the knees."

He actually snorted. "The hell I did. You're stronger than that."

Brusquely, he helped me out of the tub and leaned me against the sink while he pulled a towel out of the cabinet. He shoved it, still folded, at my chest and went to pull the plug and let the bathwater drain away as I dried myself with shaking hands.

That small distance between us helped me to calm my head if not clear it, and I felt the exhaustion of the day, the job, the life I'd fallen into settle heavily around my shoulders. I still wanted Nezumi, wanted to feel him inside me, filling me up, but I was cognizant now of just how bad the timing was and I found the thought suddenly hilarious. This whole aspect of our relationship was nothing but a string of poorly timed incidents and desires. I laughed until my knees gave out and I sank to the floor.

"Are you having hysterics? I remember how to fix that, if you need."

He crouched next to me, smirking, and I was suddenly afraid that his talk of showing me the rest of the world had been meaningless, that I would succumb to my exhaustion and wake to find him gone again. I grabbed his wrist, startling him.

"Promise me you won't leave."

It was suddenly vital to me that he should stay. I'd tried so hard not to get my hopes up when he'd reappeared. I had felt instinctively that he would not linger in No. 7, and now I was terrified that, having come so close to finally being with him in a very physical sense, our time together had run out. I felt like, if I fell asleep without having taken this next step with him, I would lose him again.

For a moment, he regarded me oddly, but then he pulled effortlessly out of my grasp and stood, rolling his eyes.

"Get up and put on your pajamas. I'm putting you to bed."

I did as I was told before tottering down the hall to my room, Nezumi following along behind. He surprised me by pushing me to sit down on the edge of my bed, then throwing a towel over my head as he sat down beside me.

"Inconsiderate airhead," he muttered, rubbing the towel to dry my hair. "You've only got the one pillow. You can't just go to bed dripping and expect to share."

"You're staying?"

"After everything I said earlier, you're doubting me?"

"Well, but…" I leaned blindly towards him and ended up with my head resting against his chest. His movements lost some of their vigor until it felt like he was petting me through the towel. "…I said all that stuff and now—" I broke off with a yawn. "We have such bad timing."

"Do you honestly think so? It seems to me that there was only a one in a million shot for me to have come across you screaming into the storm like an idiot the night we met."

"Maybe we used it all up for that." I nuzzled against him, warm and drowsy.

"Don't fall asleep. I'm talking to you."

"I really, really missed you, so much that I had to let it all out so I wouldn't go crazy. You'll still be here in the morning?"

"I already said I would be, didn't I?"

"Tomorrow we have to pick up where we left off. Promise."

"After all you put me though, you think I'd let you go back on what you said?"

Even with my eyes closed, I knew the expression he'd be wearing when he said that, knew how he would roll his eyes, and the mental image made me smile.

I must have dozed off, because the next thing I knew, I was lying in bed under the covers, sharing a pillow with Nezumi who had an arm and a leg flung over me. I curled closer to him, as tears stung the corners of my eyes. I hadn't realized how hollow I'd felt until that moment, but there in the dark, in that tiny bed, I was filled to overflowing with relief and contentment and _joy_. I couldn't remember the last time I'd felt actual joy and I let the tears come, wetting the pillow even after Nezumi had taken such pains to dry my hair.

He pulled me closer, and I didn't really care if he was awake or asleep, just that he was there. For the first time in a long time, I honestly felt like everything would be all right. I fell asleep in his arms and didn't dream of anything at all.


End file.
